Young women laughing on the back steps 

Friday night in the city- those girls are having fun- how can you be so happy- don't you know the worlds 

falling apart? It's a shithole! They're blind! it's night they can't see, they're wandering around in the dark, probably drunk! And having a barrel of laughs- I was I was them.

 shit faced Charlie

Smoking and reading Chaucer

In the Panhandle

He lies a lot but it don't matter 

It's all good 

He once ran a large advertising agency

doing ads for Shell, Nestle, and Williams- Sonoma

Those days are past

Seems he was always a liar

Pathological 

Couldn't help himself

He lied when it didn't matter

I guess he did it to make people like him?

I dunno. Told me his dad died of AIDS.

A year later he introduced me to his dad.

I guess he recovered. 

The drinking was always there but when his reputation 

caught up to him he self medicated with booze. 

Now he's living near the panhandle in an old International.

Could be worse.

 Elves and Pins (for Washington Irving)

 Lost in the woods

Flowers 

Yellow and blue, pink 

flowers and wiry plants 

Oak that is poison!

berries tons of berry plants 

too early, just pretty flowers

bears like berries!

Wildcats around 

Large birds soar overhead

Small protected creek said to contain Coho salmon

But hard to believe 

Game warden came out to see what was being done

With the culvert improvements

Children's voices laughing 

Ages 5,6,7,8,9,10

Some look kinda Asian 

some Germanic Scottish

He says they're good kids 

Nice and curious 

They live up the road

In a big red house

 

 

 

 Creature Features

  I'm Bob Wilkins

 Showing B horror movies

On Friday nights

  Smoking a big cigar 

Trying to make the cameraman crack up

  Just me and him in the studio

Channel 2

  Black Dracula!

Hammer Films!

Classic Warner Brothers!

Bride of Frankenstein!

Night of the Living Dead! (B&W cheap horror movie with a black actor in leading role!)

  and Bob with his dry wit and easy manners

Bwaahhhhaahaaaaa!

 Stowed away 

like a lost soul on an ocean going vessel

rotting ship 

I can hear above me men laughing

Glasses clinking

Dishes clanking

The rats scurry by oblivious 

To my presence

They found and put me in irons

I'd work for my keep

But I'm chained like a dog 

Like a man in the bastille

C'est vrai 

C'est fou!

 

 Congressional medal of Ignominy 

Herald broom enticed

Mr janitorial 

No such memory 

In Carmel-by - the - Sea

Stones and sand

    A '66 Vette 

in plum

  selling furniture for thirty years

and painting watercolors

 They tried 

but we were too bored

-bored by their repetitive stupidity-

bored by their transparent antics 

so foolish and inane

Bored by their greed 

-for attention!

We laughed at them

We were mad and

we made wickedly funny signs

and laughed in protest 

We laughed at them

 The moon doesn't care

It knows all

has seen it all

Circled and circled again

It's taken some punishment 

but still reflects

and we see ourselves in it 

there he is 

The Man in the Moon!

Looking down us but only at times 

Sometimes he's half there

Sometimes just a sliver

A crescent 

We give it names

Blood moon 

Wolf Moon

Strawberry moon

New moon

The Man in the Moon

Blue Moon

 

 San Francisco Blues

grey overhead and breezy 

Keep your fucking heat

Out of my mouth

It's June - time for the sun to disappear 

Until afternoon -

 

 The rhythm of

Dim gauze with a NY accent

  You burned your wrist bad

On a 40 year old Mr. Coffee machine 

2nd degree burn 

 Off to the hardware store

Tariffs tariffs tariffs 

  Get yer Jumbo Joe 

And call out the Natl. Guard

Ya pussy

 

 Held the gold

Of overhead costs

In abeyance

With past worries 

And current headaches

Stowed it away 

Again 

In stacks of paperbacks

About military endeavors

Riding a donkey in Yemen 

Bedouin memories

In Rub Al Kali

Sand and more sand

Across the wasteland

Of everyday life

2nd degree burns 

From a Mr. Coffee

Assembling a Jumbo Joe

To cook too salty tri tip

Buying dry beef jerky and tequila and cigarettes 

At Gonella's 

And some peanut M&M's

 

 Forestry silence

entwined in bullshit

tacos and drivel media

     catching a wave of stupidity

     as the climate 

   and its cohorts 

           Continue to rarify 

                          sanctimonious treelines 

Sharp axed handles

pack horses

            And mess kits

        you await Spring

         and summer

         so many winter camping 

          episodic travails

           running across a frozen lake 

                             Tom Sawyer in framed log 

     Transylvanian motels

Away away across the dunes

     reach for flapjacks  

and bacon 

time for fish's breakfast

Out on the lake

 Slough pokerface 

    Unrivaled boredom

Come freely on the off chance

Mmm gtttt

   Snack 

snap

   Poof

Another dream

   highway

Rural streaming

   Beaucoup bon temps

   cajun calamity in new clothes

a lot of nothing 

   and wasting our time 

   hurricane go away 

  piss on you 

  And your shitty lies

  

 

 Cesspool seance

Ouija on the shitter- blarg

sensing a druids presence in purple 

and gray

  watch it that's a bear!

Look what they did to your shorts!

Those are your shorts

Ohh

Ghosts of little salamanders

Marble Mountains

another chapter in the book

Of blah blah-bitty blah no 

What?

Try to make sense

  But you stopped drinking 

Instead , weed

 capture the sun

  Fly the bird

   Catch the breeze

  Be someone 

 Achktungk

  Sig ni herren

Stezen spiezzi

 "Swiss" grace before dinner

 candles lit

I hope there's no Lima beans

  Or meat loaf

William Tell showed em

Ahh spaghetti 

 Sank yer cess home pie eyed

    Hah look

it's a 

 Yeah it is

  Without warning 

   What's an electric blanket 

In the moon 

In the Big Dipper 

   Old country stars

    We need new stars!

Set a course for Orion 3

   Capn that's off base 

Oh well turn around then

  

 Sank a boat 

   In a your batons

Hahbah 

  Bah hahbah

  Thanks with fried clams

 Oh Celeste

 French Fries

And slaw 

With pickles

   and a Pepsi lite 

Sank your shoe 

In your sanity 2.0

"Make sure you get Pepsi lite!" 

draft appraisal of the range

Tried to tame a steadfast beehive headed

  girl from Southy

made out on the beach

Walked home

 I captured 

Owl Jima 

  Paths to gas

   Stow away 

    In wheel wells 

    Fracked 

      By their brain

      Auto accident in their heads 

     

 Dreading up

Americas

 sleepy cesspool wandering

      Thru Whitmans paradise

      leaves of grass 

     Leaf blowers howling

At 6:30 am 

       

 Sick of it all 

Red

  And Black Men have been on this show 

I tried it 

Now forget it

I'm gonna have a drink 

  Dref 

  Purg 

  Snurf 

Cold 

foggy 

Froggy 

In Pasadena 

Heights

San Francisco 

Casualty of remembering 

Waah waah

Why can't it be like it was

It never was

Why can't it be like it never was

Except on acid

Woof

In a 63 Ford Fairlane 4 door 

Parked behind a big rig on Murrieta blvd

Slerg 

Vrdf 

Ka plooey!

 

 

 Glick 

    Said He 

Fvfd

  Erp 

He spit

   The car was parked poorly

  Sad

  he went to Rasputins for 

used CD's

   Prince? Nah 

Garage bands 

   from Italy? 

  Maybe

He went to the discount section

   And got a pile of CD's 

Total: $8.99

  a good days shopping

one CD cost more than that, new

  Yes I'd like a bag

 

 Surprise 

 

Another day

   Remarkably similar

   to the previous

carry on

    do your laundry

    eat breakfast 

find your shoes

    Have a pee

     make the coffee

Check

check 

Check

 What does it matter?

times too short

To worry

Hah!

    Get those bills paid!

does the car need new tires?

  Is your phone dying?

 How bout your health?

You're in a sad state motherfucker!

Dream on hosehead 

That's life 

La Dee da!

 AC car days

arguing with car mate

Arguing quite a bit 

Oh well can't 

Go now

Too hot!

Manzanar imprisonment

That's America!

 Jackson, Michigan 

Long days ago

3 time loser killed trying to escape from a hospital visit

Michigan State 

Pappy had three kids and was still in school

after he graduated we packed it up

and headed to Seattle 

Guppa Guppas pulling a beer wagon

Schlitz? 

Dunno I was little 

Saw a red sunset on the ferry to Vancouver BC

 I soaked in gin

Stewed and danced

We know how to do it 

   Night Fever

Good night

 

 

 Death Valley Poems #1

Right at Olancha on 190

 To Fathers Crowley Overlook

you're in Panamint Springs

 Why Death? 

Cuz you'll die down there

but it's beautiful and hasn't changed much since

Forever

Some campsites

A few resorts

But pretty much the same

 I'm losing

time and people 

So what 

Time goes on 

So do people 

Who cares?

I'm winning

I'm laying in bed smoking

I got drunk the other night

But I had fun

Saw a famous musician 

Get into his minivan 

He's a rockstar, of course he drives a minivan!

He should write a song about it

I'd listen to that

 Dropped an echelon 

  What is mmm

sunstroke 

  tail between legs

capture 

  Travel

In a cotton balloon

It's Sunday 

sunny

I have no ideas

drugs and cigarettes 

ruined my brain

I'm just binding time

Similar to biding

But strapped on 

Like a bad novel

You finished reading

And thought

no Mark Twain

no Dickens 

  No Somerset Maugham 

no Paul Bowles

Smoking kif in Tangier 

the Casbah you'll get lost

Arab me in long shirt things

   Paul Bowles

in the international zone

Burroughs Terminator 

    Squashing bugs 

Spraying fumicide

On the typewriter insects

Walk the night

Ain't nothing here

Walk the field

  With the goats

 

 

 Asleep 

Like a wild donkey

You shot yourself in the foot

You wandered for days 

found a Star Wars paper mask

Imperial trooper 

Pretended you were Harry Dean Stanton

in Paris, Texas

in Star Wars 

Lost in a time far far away

   found out nothing is true 

except Fairy Lanterns

 and pins of elves

 

 Behind the past

   See the stairs

See the parallel 

   Ballc

Man

X y g

   Go to the corner store

   Emphatic morose

  times beacon 

  Down on the sidewalk

The captain couldn't stop

eating the peanut butter

   They told him to stop

Life in Oakland

  The trees are beautiful 

 Haha

Hailed the cross current 

of New Jersey

swept to New England

the Shire of Hamp

  master of the pine sap

  Elves hat in a Elves circle 

   An empty circle in the thick forest 

  a basketball was magic

  But Dad hated the thumping against the house

  Poor Phd motherfucker

  Go Wildcats!

  Walking to school in the snow

  Oyster River Elementary

  Kissed a girl on the jungle jim

  Eleanor Boy

 

 

 Catch me

I'm a falling rock

Like nobody

the fog is rolling in

But I'm in bed

  Where's the cat?

   Oh I don't have a cat

   Shoot

   Meow

   C as Tammy 

   Stop the downloading!

 

 The movement was a stupid

Dreams are for suckers

   Stupid nincompoops

    Hail stupidity

We are the what 

  Got gas?

                       Where are we going?

To Mt. Stupid

Everybody get in!

 I'm no hero

Time is short

But who cares

Millions of people are assholes

and they're proud of it

"We schooled the libtards. Jack in the box or Wendy's tonight?"

A lot of people are just regular folks. They don't really pay attention and who can blame them? Why would you want to pay attention when it's awful?

We all get sucked in to the vortex of hatred. Those fucking assholes. Cest la vie.

 Haiku #69

doing it in real time

Can you believe the wind

On 22nd & Valencia

HAIKU # Morgan Stanley

  

You and yers 401(k)

sweet holy uncertainty of the money

Changers; and the temple is for

sale

Grandma's HAIKU #1934

Three girls and a man with a fused neck;

It's okay it may be a depression but 

There's Beef Tongue and Lima beans

For dinner

HAIKU ATCHOO!

Red pepper and celery; 

You roasted at the lost dreams

You sneezed and waived goodbye

 

 Moving on

the ambiguity of life

A snails pace

leaving a trail of slime 

screaming at the clouds

Who's your daddy now!!

Well just a thing 

No never mind

My stomachs fucked up

I shouldn't lay down 

But it's annoying

Oh well sometimes you gotta 

Get your ducks in a row 

Before you start blasting

 HAIKU #99

Keep a little lock  

    On tomorrows sorrow

Watch the caterpillar drown

In a glass of 7Up

Ooh that didn't really work

Let's try again

 

Cafe girls are cute 

 But forty years might be a barrier

The fog is blown by the wind

Hah not so 

Train yourself

To be yourself

Lay down in a field and cry

HAIKU #98

Step back

Quie Chang Caine

The masters eyes are white

and you forgot to leave 

HAIKU #11

Go on home

Go fuck yourself

As if that was even possible 

The end!

 I ain't got no luck

Yippedy Yoo!

 I've tried a number of times

but following through is not my forte

Maybe I'm my own worst enemy- who knows?

 I guess I thought it would be easier

  but no 

   nobody gives a shit

  You have to forge right on past that

   Sell the sizzle! 

  Fuck that

I am what I yam

  and lots of ex- girlfriends 

I have old birthday cards

   They love me so much!

   but where are they now?

Ahh my own damn fault

But they were pretty hot!

 Woke w a headache

Nothing drastic. Just mild pain. So what. 

The birds are chirping outside. It's a nice summery morning in San Francisco. Bright sunshine, cool breezes of the ocean. I don't deserve to live here but I've paid my dues. So what. 

We've had hella roommates. People come and people go. Some are still friends others I barely remember. One guy was scheduled to move in and before the move in date he brought all his stuff and we stored it in the hallway. The day came but no sign of him. Two more days passed and still no sign. We called his old place. 

"Oh, you didn't hear? He passed away. OD'd."

We were kind of in shock. We had all his stuff. 

His parents came to collect his stuff. They wanted his rent money and deposit. 

We were like sorry we had to pay the rent. We gave them the deposit and told them if we find someone quickly we'd give them the difference. They were annoyed they didn't get all the money and took his shit and left.

We called a woman we'd said no to and offered her the room. She said she'd take it at the end of the month.

Life goes on. So what.

 Lady Death wasn't feeling well.

She complained.

"So many fucking people and they're all so shitty."

"They see me and they start whining. I'm only 54 years old! Do they think I give a shit?! I got a job to do! Maybe you shouldn't have been driving blind drunk on that mountainous road? Dumbass. It's not my problem but I have to listen to them and they all start to sound the same."

I nodded in agreement.

"Will you make me a sandwich?"

"One of those roast chicken sandwiches with mayo and onions? Thanks."

She grumbled off to the kitchen. 

I turned the tv up louder. Walter Cronkite was interviewing some dignitary.

 Spotty

wired eyes

    morning 

       at Bay to Breakers

     cars racing parallel looking 

            for a way to cross

     good luck with that

       DoorDash motorized "bicycle"guys 

riding on the sidewalk 

I fucking hate people 

Poor me 

     Haha

     Jeez

   Who cares 

I got my coffee

and a bacon egg brioche

at Peets 

   no Kenyans yet 

Where is the helicopter?

I'm in the vomit zone 

at least they have porta potties

Grumble grumble grumble

 I moved in with Lady Death

She had black fingernails 

and powder white skin

Her lips were either blood red or black & blue

depending on what time of day it was

She rode a 69 El Dorado with the roof cut off

She was continually getting stopped

"Is that factory convertible?"

She had a long line of exes. Their clothes filled the closets. 

"Whose was this?!"

"Ack, that was a fat blond grease salesman from Akron Ohio"

"Huh"

 

 

 I was a Fireball guy for awhile

Before that it was Bourbon. I can't remember the name of it but I should. I went through a ton of those during the pandemic. I put the empties on the kitchen table until there wasn't any room left. I'd never been a drink at home guy much but I figured it out during Covid. Bulliet. Frontier whiskey. I'm not sure what the frontier was. Where lands for taking and Indians'll take your scalp! Then I started with Fireball. Not sure why. It was kind of sweet and cinnamony, easy to get down. Fireball! 

 I had an imperfect dream

  all nmmm and

nodding Jim Carroll

  Peter Carini

On Lausatt

 With his cats 

  And his dripping notebook

  at the Expansion bar

W cartoonist

Who threw it in the tub of soapy water

Jewish Space Pirates 

   that's all gone 

Buh bye

  Laughing at the back bar

99 cent well drinks 

  New book store 

we could smoke in the bookstore(!)

  All calendars $3.99

"Even this one?!"

Personalities 

  some clashed 

strange bunch 

Maggie (her gf drowned on a rafting trip)

   One got mad when she found out what I was getting paid. Quit and moved to NY worked for the New Yorker.

Hector

Peter K went on to be an ACO

Cay went to grad school in CT (quit one quarter before getting her masters) she hated her advisor 

 When I quit to work at a photo lab there were like he did all the work! Fucking idiots

Bookstore Church and market 1986

 Torn up

By the sight 

  of no one 

  There's nothing to stand in the way

  Nothing but you

   I'm not even me

  And I've forgotten you 

 The highway to nowhere 

Driving in the morning. Coffee and a breakfast sandwich. Listening to the Byrds. I never listened to the Byrds. It's the road to nowhere. 

I'd get up in the morning, hot shower and then I'm off. Never quite sure where. I'll see how I feel after five hours. Sometimes I just keep going. Sometimes I'd have a clear destination. Just got to make it to Rufusville. Pine Oaks motel $80/ night. Sometimes I'd get there at 1 pm. I'd lay down and take a nap then go out. I'd get a bottle of Fireball. I'd drink the bottle in the car and drive around Rufusville and see what it's about. How are they doing? What are they doing? Getting on with life. I'd find a Chinese or Thai restaurant if I was lucky. Nowhere is pretty much everywhere. I should start a team. The Nowhere Matadors. The Everywhere Wildcats. The Fireball Car Drunks. The Rufusville Byrds cd's. After dinner I'd stop and load up on supplies. Snacks sandwiches water Fireball chips cigarettes then back to the Pine Oaks and crank up the AC. Good night Nowhere.

 Snoozin' on the backwards dream

Two or three pills last night. I woke up at 4 am and puked. Went back to sleep. I'm not working. I got zero worries but I worry about pretty much every damn thing.

I used to travel- Mexico, New York. I drove across country a couple years ago. It seems like a lifetime. I'm a sour old piece of crap. Good for nothing. Have I given up? Some days it sure seems like it. No booze no drugs pills pills pills blood pressure cholesterol glucose blah blah blah. Why am I trying to be healthy if I don't do anything? Complain complain complain. OkayBOOMER

BOOM YER BON TEMPS fuck n Aaaaaaa

Crumpin criminey Sat mmm

Say goodnight dick

Yer a dick

Yeah what are you gonna do about it?

Oh nothing 

Maybe go to Bi-Rite and get some groceries 

 Call me Robinson Crusoe

I'm lost in the the middle of nothing. An island of a city. Everyone is against me. Fuck em. I hate everything. Maybe that's why no one likes me. Ya think?

Nothing works out. So what? Fuck it. 

Just kidding. I'm a regular person. 

 Coffee and pills

Weird dreams. I gotta get all my stuff. We gotta go!

Did Hemingway have bad dreams? A Jewish man is dating his love! Fuck Hemingway.

My tooth hurts. They pulled a wisdom tooth that had a giant hole in it. A cavity. It's healing but painfully. Pain pills and antibiotics. What day is it?

Monday. My friend gave me an Oxycodone but I think I lost it. I put in an empty cigarette pack. 

If you take one of those you don't feel pain. Just lay in bed and nod out blissfully. Life isn't so bad. I can see how you could easily get hooked.

Monday. 

 Dream the Robinson Jeffers dream

he built a stone tower

To keep the world at bay

He could hear the roar of the ocean

The screams of sea birds

CRASH

the waves pound in time

 and walked the trails of hot days

  Hawk spying from above

  Rabbits running scared

  Mice hiding in holes

  Donkey bored and chewing grass

  Turtles on the beach

 

 Across

the pimpled horizon 

  acne scars and amoxicillin 

What time is it?

Gahd damn

At the expensive market

the guys in the deli

didn't know what cold cuts are

  "You make sandwiches for a living"

No se lo que es senor 

Ahh pobrecito

California reclaimed 

  To the tune of 

Cu ca racha!

  Hey Pinche

Pendejo for president

  I'm joking but seriously

You're racist!

Okay somewhat!

   Conundrum wrapped in a muscle car

  Hyundai!